Tokyo MoU Finds 16 Knackered Crews

Tokyo MoU inspectors detained 16 ships on deficiencies related to hours of rest between September 1 and November 30, 2014.

Preliminary results from the Concentrated Inspection Campaign (CIC) on STCW Hours of Rest for the 3 month period show that the hours of rest deficiencies constituted 7.77% of all detentions during CIC.

Main areas of concern are hours of rest not being recorded properly and watch-keeping personnel without sufficient rest.

Investigations into a number of recent incidents throughout the Asia-Pacific region have identified fatigue and insufficient rest of watch-keeping personal as key contributing factors in these incidents. There has been a significant loss of human life and damage to the marine environmental resulting from many of these incidents.

During the campaign most inspections occurred on bulk carriers with 2,206 (35%) inspections, followed by general cargo/multi-purpose ships with 1,361 (21%) inspections, container ships with 1,154 (18%) inspections and chemical tankers with 436 (7%) inspections.

Five of the detained ships were general cargo/multi-purpose ships, three were container ships, two bulk carriers and two vehicle carriers and four on other ship types.

Analysis of the recorded deficiencies shows that most deficiencies relate to hours of rest not being recorded correctly, vessel manning not in accordance with the minimum safe manning document, and shipboard working arrangements.

The flag with the highest number of CIC-topic related detentions was Panama with five CIC-topic related detentions.